GemRB 0.9.5 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 23:05:20 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new major release.

It features significant changes in several areas. The audio subsystem received many improvements and input handling was upgraded especially for users of controllers. The pathfinding performance was dramatically increased, some tests quantifying that as 13-161 % for short paths, 48-196 % for medium paths, 68-146 % for long paths. EE-like zoom is now available in all games, just set "Zoom Lock" to 0 in the gem-*.ini file in your game folder.

On the game support side of things this release brings many improvements for IWD2, now considered as polished as the other games, several fixes for PST and more work on compatibility with the EEs. Support for BG2EE is still experimental, but the Shadows of Amn portion is known to be completable. Our demo received a much nicer avatar and new asset creation capabilities were added (like animations not limited to 15 FPS).

Due to user feedback the SDL1 backend has not been deprecated, but provisionally updated. There is a wish to move to C++17 in the next release cycle. If this would negatively impact your platform, do let us know.

Sources and packages are available. You can get them from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.9.5 (2026-03-23):
  New features:

    - partial audio system rewrite for better (spatial) audio and music
    - iwd2: customizable action bar, weapon set switching, item usability info
    - detect illusions, spell info on right-click, various hardcoded pst bonuses
    - smooth keyboard scrolling, in-game zoom
    - GUI enhancements are now configurable from within the game

  Improved features:

    - pathfinder and drawing speedups
    - video players, animations, controller input
    - iwd2 weapon sets, pst GUI, pst level up, ee compatibility
    - scripting, effects, projectiles
    - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time, including:
2play, Andrej Pancik, ArminiusTux, arosenow, Ashvith10, Balxkodehodet, BinBashBanana, Boris Kruglov, Brad Allred, Bubb13, burner1024, CalamariDetective, Clort, CodeSpartan, Dariusz Pyś, DartPower, dbojan, dolio, exhuman, Florian Piesche, HugeTaffer, Jaka Kranjc, Jens Kleine-Herzbruch, JohnSmithBH84, Juan Mathews Rebello Santos, jvgp100, Lucas Z., MarcelHB, mark-314159, markfoged, MvKord, orcutt989, packrat0x, nerifuture, Peppersawce, quangtrinhvan93, Rodrigo Santellan, rubyFeedback, Stefan Schlosser, StVitruvius, Timo Gurr, traveler-gemrb, Tugcga, Ulroxiel, Warphi.

Notes to packagers:

There is a wish to move to C++17 in the next release. If this would negatively impact your platform, let us know.
New config keys were added and some removed, so if you ship your own config defaults, we recommend syncing them with these changes:
GUIEnhancements has been removed and is now stored in the main game ini file plus configurable through the options screen
GamepadPointerAccel, GamepadLDeadZone, GamepadRDeadZone are keys for customizing controller input parameters
UseSoftKeyboard was unused and has been removed
EdgeScrollOffset determines when to trigger area scrolling when the cursor is close to the window edge
GamepadSupport replaces the compile time define USE_SDL_CONTROLLER_API

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the gemrb-release mailing list.

GemRB 0.9.4 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Sat, 11 Jan 2025 09:48:26 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new release.

It brings two exciting major developments. First, for the first time ever, one is now able to play Icewind Dale 2 from start to end. That marks the last original game to reach this status.
BG2EE support has been experimental and is not yet ready for wide use, but as of this release it is now playable enough to welcome testers and power users to bug hunting adventures (manually set GameType to bg2ee).
Besides that the release features several improvements to pathfinding, audio and ease-of-use for other projects.

Sources and packages are available. You can get them from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.9.4 (2025-01-11):
New features:
  - iwd2 is now fully completable!
  - iwd2 turn undead, hybrid damage types, Heal Party on Rest
  - traditional bg2ee GUI is usable and the shaman class works
  - option to highlight learnable scrolls, draw empty containers gray
  - option to more easily use GemRB as a library
  - animfps.2da to set per-animation drawing speed

Improved features:
  - text encoding, drawing speed, drawing, (stereo) audio, GUI internals
  - feats, animations
  - scripting, projectiles, effects, movement speed, pathfinding
  - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time, including:
Ashvith10, Bubb13, DarthRevan501st, HJ000001, MarcelHB, Mariihmp, Mingun, Peppersawce, Kassandra Pucher, arosenow, bhbuehler, burner1024, duy64, elde-n, Jan Palus, Jaka Kranjc, Sergej Alikov, rfht, Rodrigo Santellan, Tim Lancina, Tom Kidd.

Notes to packagers:
- The unmaintained SDL1 backend will be removed in next release.
- A new UseAsLibrary key has been added to the config.
- A new bit was added to the GUIEnhancements bit field, so if you ship your own configs, an update to the new higher default value is encouraged.

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the gemrb-release mailing list.

GemRB 0.9.3 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Wed, 10 Jul 2024 22:12:38 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new release.

As a year's worth of work this release brings a bunch of improvements. Players will notice
pathfinder speed optimizations, better sound logic, chunking and plenty of polishing.
Non-English player woes have been fully laid to rest, with any combination of game, system
and filesystem encoding properly taken into account.

Sources and packages are available. You can get them from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.9.3 (2024-07-10):
      New features:
        - full i18n (language) support, custom journal entries
        - chunking approximation
        - BMP v3 and v5 support
        - small test suite, tracy support
        - iwd2 identification variants and speed data
        - nwn-for-bg2 compatibility

    Improved features:
        - area music, creature & area sounds
        - colored logging, pathfinding, drawing
        - ee compat, effects, modals, projectiles, familiars
        - iwd2 & pst worldmap
        - switched to c++14, build system
        - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time, including:
11jo, akdjka, alvv-z, Andrea Cardaci, Andrea Palmatè, anijatsu, ArtemS2, blender-girl, Brad Allred, Bubb, burner1024, DarkMalex, davidagnome, DDQW, Domagoj Stolfa, Dreamkins, Fernside2, i30817, Jaka Kranjc, K1ngst0m, Rod Batten, Rodrigo Santellan, MarcelHB, mariomartinezm, Mateusz Hercuń, Matthieu Volat, Mingun, orcutt989, Piotr Kubaj, PowaBanga, SilentMRG, skellytz, Solène Rapenne, Stefan Schlosser, tomasz89, Tom Kidd, traveler-gemrb, ynorsa, zebez.

Notes to packagers:
- an optional ScaleQuality key has been added to the sample configs,
- the Fullscreen key has been removed (the in-game setting is preferred)
- the build system is now even more modular, so you can tweak more of it

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the
gemrb-release
mailing list.

GemRB 0.9.2 released!

Travis — Sat, 08 Jul 2023 15:21:11 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new major release.

It brings in many improvements for Planescape: Torment, configurable AI speed, improved performance and others. Notably GemRB now also
supports PVR(Z) based formats, making content creation easier, most new opcodes/actions/triggers and together with some infrastructural changes,
BG2EE games can now be loaded (still not playable though!).

Sources and packages are available. You can get them from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.9.2 (2023-07-08):
  New features:
    - PVR(Z), BAM2, MOS2 and TIS2 support
    - support for higher AI speeds ("FPS") and VSync
    - support for EE-style saves, TLK locations and many more tables
    - PST's floating text and personalized pc comments
    - optional smooth fog of war on SDL >= 2.0.18
    - 3e-style sneak attack and crippling strike from HoW/iwdee
    - Anbernic device support

  Improved features:
    - PST effect durations
    - performance, pathfinding, formations
    - combat, opcodes, EE compat, hp handling, demo
    - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time, including: Brad Allred, Bubb, burner1024, desecaw13, dikau, fizzet, FrElvire, Jaka Kranjc, kloptops, Konrad Klimaszewski, majcosta, MarcelHB, Mingun, Rod Batten, Rodrigo Santellan, Tomsod, Zoltan Gyokeres.

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the
gemrb-release
mailing list.

GemRB 0.9.1 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Mon, 29 Aug 2022 20:21:44 -0000

GemRB 0.9.1 released!

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new release.

It features loads of improvements in core game systems, making Icewind Dale II almost completable, but also in the rest of the engine. Among other things this means further improved speed, better unicode support and deprecation of Python 2 support. As usual the release also comes with many smaller features, bug fixes, polishing and code cleanups.

Sources and packages are available. You can get them from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.9.1 (2022-08-29):
  New features:
    - iwd2 can be progressed to well into chapter 5
    - faster loading and saving, faster OpenGL rendering
    - Use magic device skill, precise shot, iwd1 bard song choice
    - SDLAudio plugin now supports ambients
    - console history is now preserved, more text colors externalized
    - logging is now done via fmt (bundled headers)

  Improved features:
    - python3 support (now the only option)
    - unicode support (iconv not optional any more!)
    - spellcaster ai, effects, scripting, projectiles, weapon style customization
    - audio, drawing, appimage, ini spawns
    - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time, including:
Adrien2002, Arc0re, Argent77, Brad Allred, Bubb, burner1024, chilvence, Clemens Tiedt, Cowcat5150, dagdha2002, Dan Church, Dariusz Okoń, Darpaek, DudeMcDude, Emwues, fizzet, FrElvire, Gabriel Sztorc, goduck777, Isso4820, jabaldwin, Jaka Kranjc, jheronimus, Laulajatar, m7600, MarcelHB, Michael Schellenberger Costa, Mingun, Northfear, reallyhairydave, Rhastor, Rodrigo Santellan, romadu, Sébastien Noel, shinra-electric, skellytz, Steamcrusher, Stephen E. Baker, Stephen Kitt, STyx2909, syzygos-mideias, Timothy Hyers, Tomsod, TotalCaesar659, Zimmermann Gyula.

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the
gemrb-release
mailing list.

GemRB 0.9.0 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Fri, 18 Jun 2021 15:04:24 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new major release.

Over six years in the making, growing in scope with time, the subviews branch
was a true monster. But the quest to lay it to rest has now been successfully
completed, among other things modernizing the GUI, drawing and input handling. For most use cases, there is no need for the Widescreen mod any more.

The SDL2 backend is now mature and default, OpenGL support is not experimental
any more, most benefiting Mac users. Additionally, in the last minutes between
the merge and this release, Python 3 support was added and our demo
received an ending.

If you don't believe that this is a big upgrade, consider just the changes from
the branch. It included 3527 commits, 668 changed files, and over 30,000
changed lines of code. That's about every fifth line!

You can get the new GemRB from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.9.0 (2021-06-18):
  New features:
    - basic resolution independence
    - python3 support
    - arbitrary window dragging support
    - improved debug console
    - subtitle support for BIK videos

  Improved features:
    - window management, drawing and input handling
    - performance: SDL2 video playback, general and text rendering
    - smoother movement animations, demo
    - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time and wit, including:

Bernd Schmidt, Brad Allred (main author), Diego J., fizzet, FrElvire, Jaka Kranjc,
Laurie Chilvers, m7600, MarcelHB, Northfear, Rodrigo Santellan.

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the
gemrb-release
mailing list.

Notes to packagers:

Python 3 support has been added.

SDL2 is now the default backend and anyone still on SDL1 is encouraged to switch.

If you are packaging from git sources, not the archive, either run
make fetch-demo-data first or manually include the files.
These are (currently two) bigger assets kept in a separate repository.

Configuration notes (details):

key TooltipDelay was deprecated (was unused, there is an ingame option)
key ScriptDebugMode was renamed to DebugMode and received more values
key FogOfWar was deprecated for GCDebug
new key GCDebug can be used to draw various debug features of maps
new key TouchInput for force disabling or enabling ...

GemRB 0.8.8 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Wed, 02 Jun 2021 17:34:50 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new (minor) release.

This release features improvements in several areas, with no new major subsystems. You might be thinking: "What's this, weren't we promised subviews?!" and the answer to that is: yes! Stay tuned for another release in the following days as we integrate the branch back and do some final retesting.

Currently only the sources and some packages are available. You can get them from https://gemrb.org/Install

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.8.8 (2021-06-02):
  New features:
    - gameplay content for the demo
    - Heart of Fury support
    - SDLAudio caching and volume control
    - PlayStation Vita port
    - simpler invocation, AppImage packages

  Improved features:
    - lightning bolts, iwd2 stealth, iwd effects, pst levelup
    - scripting, audio backends, logging
    - build system, portability and performance improvements
    - externalized summoning limit, trap limit, narration text speed
    - bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time, including:

2play, Alan1616, Alan1616, Balrog994, Bernd Schmidt, Brad Allred, Bubb13, Cowcat5150, Cristi Mitrana, Destroyer5150, FrElvire, Jaka Kranjc, Jan Petykiewicz, Kevin Michael Frick, Khaled Hosny, Laurie Chilvers, MarcelHB, Mariusz Obajtek, Northfear, Poligraf, Rodrigo Santellan, Ryein Goddard, SharkyRawr, Toulonnais72, afxgroup, bittin, burner1024, emorrp1, escalade, fenuks, fizzet, luke243, m7600, nerd-rage, neula, psilyntdev, rfht, samo79, tonyRecordOn.

If you want to be notified of GemRB releases via email, subscribe to the https://sourceforge.net/projects/gemrb/lists/gemrb-release mailing list.

The GemRB project celebrates 20 year anniversary with a new release

Jaka Kranjc — Mon, 24 Aug 2020 08:28:58 -0000

The GemRB team announces the availability of GemRB 0.8.7, a new minor release to kick off a week of celebrations of the project’s founding anniversary. 20 years ago, on the 21st of August, the project initiator Daniele Colantoni registered it on SourceForge to try to make it a team effort. Many things have happened since, the path was convoluted and bumpy, but GemRB has continued to grow throughout the years.

https://gemrb.org/2020/08/24/the-gemrb-project-celebrates-20-year-anniversary-with-a-new-release.html

GemRB 0.8.7 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Mon, 24 Aug 2020 08:28:26 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new release.

The new release brings over 500 changes manifested as bugfixes, smaller features, cleanups and an improved setup experience. More than that, it introduces a new smarter pathfinder with bumping support and other movement related improvements. At the same time work continued on the drawing and GUI handling rewrite — stay tuned for a deeper dive later this week. With this anniversary release out of the way, finishing that rewrite is again our main priority.

You can generally get GemRB from here.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.8.7 (2020-08-23):
  New features:
    - new smarter pathfinder with bumping support
    - animal taming, iwd2 hardcoded saving throw bonuses
    - vcpkg and out-of-the box msvc support
    - non-ascii data filename support

  Improved features:
    - disk reading speedups, ease of setup
    - iwd chargen, pst spell timing, hardcoded overlays, iwd2 casting ai
    - better actor speeds & walk sounds
    - audio, pst ini handling, savegame compatibility, morale handling
    - effects, projectiles, actions, range calculations
    - bugfixes

  Notes:
    - switched to c++11 and cmake 3.1 as a minimum
    - dropped windows 9x compatibility

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time and wit, including:

bholland, burner1024, Biswapriyo Nath, Boris Kruglov, Brad Allred, Bubb, caillean7, fenuks, fizzet, FrElvire, HumanG33k, ifyGecko, Ignat Insarov, Jaka Kranjc, Kapizor, Kevin Michael Frick, Laurie Chilvers, Lukáš Valenta, MarcelHB, Mingun, neula, Northfear, Rune Morling, schyzophrene-asynchrone, stuffu.

If anyone is wondering about the release name: a small problem was blocking the famoust PST line from being heard. And it’s appropriate for the anniversary.

GemRB 0.8.6 released!

Jaka Kranjc — Thu, 28 Nov 2019 23:13:51 -0000

The GemRB team is proud to announce a new release.

Two years in the making, this release is as full of fixes and polishing as Tiax is of himself. The most noticeable changes are for BG1 players, since it lacked more audio mechanics than any other game, but all the rest received ample attention as well. Modding is now also easier, but you'll have to wait for the next WeiDU release. The pathfinder upgrade was delayed, but you can expect a state-of-the-art version in the next release, which will focus on finishing the GUI handling rewrite. You can help us get there faster: https://github.com/gemrb/gemrb/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md)

You can get GemRB from here on SourceForge.

Full changelog digest:

GemRB v0.8.6 (2019-11-24):
New features:
- more audio, especially in bg1 and pst
- sndchann.2da support
- using bags in stores, NPC breaking points, worldmap travel in pst

Improved features:
- better megamod and detectable spells compatibility
- iwd2 and pst levelup, infopoints, gui feedback, dualclassing, ranges
- verbal constants, (tobex) opcodes, falling, paperdolls, projectiles
- pst area animations, multipalette animations
- bugfixes

Thanks to everyone that contributed their time and wit, including:
Askmewho, Beren Minor, bholland, Brad Allred, Bubb, caillean7, countbuggula, cygarniczka, Dan Church, edheldil, Eitan Adler, fizzet, fogobogo, FrElvire, ifyGecko, Ilya Zhuravlev, Jaka Kranjc, Jérôme Duval, Kevin Michael Frick, khelban12, Lyle Hanson, Manuel Alfayate Corchete, MarcelHB, MesmericOrb, Mingun, miqlas, nerd-rage, Nicolás Clotta, skellytz, sten13, Tomsod, tomudo, Wisp and Yorick Hardy.

If anyone is wondering what's up with the release name: squirrels didn't land any hits before, due to the way a detail in our combat code was implemented. Now the immortal squirrel of Easthaven can have its revenge.

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